They Never Saved Me a Seat, So I Built My Own Table novel · Chapter 10 of 24

Chapter 10: She's Not a Coat

Seth's POV

Paola set her palm flat on the white tablecloth and looked at me across the room.

"Seth," she said. "Would you wait outside for a few minutes? I need to do this part without anyone watching."

It was a question, and it was one I had been hoping she would ask.

It was also the one I least wanted to say yes to.

My whole body wanted to stand up and put myself between her and that table.

"Of course," I said. "I'll be on the stoop."

I thanked her father for the seat, and he gave me a nod I could not read, and I walked out through the front hall past a wall of framed school photographs.

In almost every one of them, Paola was at the edge of the picture.

The stoop was cold and clean, with a line of plastic reindeer in the yard.

I stood at the bottom of the steps with my hands in my coat pockets and counted the lit windows on the block.

I had never done anything harder than going out that door.

Last August I had read two hundred portfolios in a week, and hers was the one I kept going back to.

I had not told her that, and tonight was not the night.

The front door opened behind me after about two minutes, and I did not need to turn to know it was her brother.

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